"Both of these shootings, Patricia Sweany and George Waldum, they live with me," he said. "Every time I see a Volkswagen Jetta GTI, I have a vision of George Waldum, because that's the car he had in his driveway. Every time I see a blue sweatshirt and jeans on a woman, I see Patricia Sweany, consistently and repeatedly."

Maybe it's a very good thing his road rage victim was not wearing a blue sweatshirt and driving a Jetta.

Perhaps when the FBI finally steps in to investigate the Portland Police Bureau from the top down, they will examine Westerman's computers to determine if he looked up the identity of his victim after the first road rage incident and tailed her, leading to the second.

Duin calls this guy the de facto chief of police and claims he aspires to be the actual chief someday.

If Westerman's story accurately reflects the facts, we're left with the impression that he gets out of his car and yells at other drivers at least as often as twice in 48 hours, and that he doesn't remember the same (pretty distinctive) car or its driver even two days later.

"Both of these shootings, Patricia Sweany and George Waldum, they live with me," he said. "Every time I see a Volkswagen Jetta GTI, I have a vision of George Waldum, because that's the car he had in his driveway. Every time I see a blue sweatshirt and jeans on a woman, I see Patricia Sweany, consistently and repeatedly."

Every time I hear comments like these, I see another phony disability claim on the way.

Don't know if anyone else noticed, but a consecutive story in WW has audio and transcripts of the first call Thompson made, to the PPD non-emergency line, where an officer gives his reaction to the description of the incident:

Some gems from the recording include comments on Westerman’s behavior by Officer Doug Oliver, the cop who took Thompson’s call. Thompson reported to Oliver that the then-unknown officer exited his car, flashed his badge, yelled and threatened to have her arrested for allegedly flashing her car’s high beams (which she insists she didn’t do). Oliver did not know at the time that the cop involved was his union president.

"Abe" writes "I can see an outbreak of the Blue Flu coming soon. Won't that be exciting." and I'd say the best way to cure "Blue Flu" is to wholesale fire their a$$e$ and be damned and done with 'em one time for all time! Ronald Reagan fired the PATCO air traffic controllers in the early 1980's and that dramatically changed their mode of doing business after-wards for those that were re-hired. Same here as surely there is list of "good cops" that be worthy of "consideration" for re-hire and a list of "bad cops" and "rogue cops" that all will chuckle at at having finally gotten rid of their a$$e$. With high unemployment in the state, it'd shouldn't be all that difficult to find replacements, provided they change the people now in charge of recruitment/vetting of potential recruits ((these characters may be source of why there is such bad characters as in "bad characters recruit bad characters"))

I'm thinking there is a lot more to this fragmented story.
Listen to the audio,read the comments.

"She mentions on the tape after the officer asks her if she got the license plate, “I didn’t spend six years at radio for nothing…” That refers to Bureau of Emergency Communications” so she must have been a dispatcher…"

She knows proper conduct and procedure that an officer should have. They are going to have a heck of a time making her the bad guy. Westerman is most certainly setting up for disability retirement.

Having had one for two years, it seems as if there is a certain type of bully personality that gets pissed off at someone driving a smart. I've noticed a lot more people tailgating than I did when I was driving a Ford Escort wagon. A friend of my wife's says she gets similar reactions from some people in her Jaguar convertible.

Most of the people who come up to me in parking lots are quasi-interested, but from time to time I get a guy — usually driving a beater truck of some sort — who says something like: "I wouldn't be caught dead in one of them deathtraps." I usually ask them if they're too scared to ride a motorcycle and they say: "Hell, no!" (or a reasonable approximation). Then I mention the steel cage, the four air bags, the seatbelts, and the fact that it's a lot more stable than a motorcycle, what with the four wheels.

It can pass on uphill grades on the way to the coast, it'll do 85 on the freeway (not that I ever have, Sgt. Westerman). I'm not a small guy, but I've done Portland to San Jose with just stops for gas, so it's comfortable enough. It's not a hybrid and doesn't get the gas mileage of a Prius, but even when gas gets to $4/gallon this summer it'll take a lot of gallons to make up the price difference between my convertible smart and a Prius.

Concordbridge, that's the big smart car, the four-passenger model that isn't available in the US. It's just eight inches shorter than a Ford Fiesta. The two-passenger smart Westerman flipped out about is three-and-a-half feet shorter than the four-passenger car in your photo.

Road Work

Miles run year to date: 80
At this date last year: 89
Total run in 2014: 401
In 2013: 257
In 2012: 129
In 2011: 113
In 2010: 125
In 2009: 67
In 2008: 28
In 2007: 113
In 2006: 100
In 2005: 149
In 2004: 204
In 2003: 269